Yesterday and the Risky Business of Gaining the World

                Sometimes the fantastic, seemingly impossible elements in a story bring acute attention to the real human drama and dynamism we would miss if said fantastic elements were absent. Such is the case in Yesterday (2019), when struggling musician Jack Malik (Himesh Patel) faces the possibility of a whole new life caused by a world that has never heard of The Beatles. The movie does not seek to explain how this could happen, and one would miss the real meaning of the story by obsessing over the physics of alternate timelines and parallel universes (Avengers: Endgame, anyone?). However, this fantastic plot twist highlights the struggle in every human heart: will I choose to gain the whole world but lose my soul? (cf. Mark 8:36)

                Jack has wanted a career in music for years, but most of his gigs have been small, largely unattended venues with little indication of any change or upward momentum. At the beginning of the film, Jack is ready to hang up his music for good, and the only one who believes in him and wants him to not give up is his best friend, Ellie (Lily James). After a worldwide power surge wherein Jack is hit by a bus, he slowly realizes that he now exists in a world that, while largely continuous with its past, is one in which The Beatles never existed. Though he needs to relearn The Beatles’ music by memory, Jack makes the fateful choice to begin playing their music at gigs and presenting it as his own.

                After a series of events involving recording an EP, playing as an opener for Ed Sheeran and “winning” in an impromptu music composition competition, Jack lands the opportunity of a lifetime when Sheeran’s manager Debra (Kate McKinnon) offers to be Jack’s agent. In her ritzy, beachside Malibu home, Debra asks Jack if he is ready to drink from the chalice of money and fame, and he replies in the affirmative. Couched in this somewhat religious language, I could not help but think of Jesus’ temptation in the desert by the devil, who promised Jesus the whole world if He but worshipped the devil (cf. Matthew 4:1-11, Mark 1:12-13, Luke 4:1-13). Debra represents the powerful lure of the world, and after Jack says yes, the promise of worldly success rapidly comes upon him. The curious thing about the devil’s promise is that it’s not necessarily a false one, even though he is the father of lies. Examples in the past and present show how one can indeed gain the whole world through power, honor, wealth and sensual pleasure if one makes those things his or her goal in life and is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve them. The question is not whether the world will deliver on its promise but whether what the world delivers is what ultimately satisfies the human heart.

                Even though Jack is living in a lie, the lie is working out well for him, from a worldly perspective. He is well on his way to becoming the most successful musician ever in the shortest amount of time. At the same time, the more success Jack achieves, the more he realizes that his lifestyle is pulling him away from his heart’s true desire, Ellie. She has apparently loved him ever since they were in middle school and has waited patiently for him to respond. When it’s clear that Jack’s success is taking their lives in very different directions, Ellie decides to move on and begins a new relationship, even as she supports Jack’s musical success. Seeing the possibility of a life with Ellie slipping away is killing Jack on the inside, even though he could probably be with any woman he wanted due to his success. Nevertheless, his desire for Ellie is not a generic desire for any woman; it is a desire for her, specifically, because love, it seems, is always particular. God loves humankind and all creation universally because He loves each of us and everything particularly.

                Through the help of two strangers who also remember The Beatles, Jack meets an elderly John Lennon, who was never assassinated in this new reality. John lives in a simple house on the English coast, which presents a stark contrast to Debra’s Malibu mansion. In the manner of a wise sage, John, after narrating how good his simple life has been, tells Jack, “You want a good life? It isn’t complicated. Tell the girl you love that you love her and tell the truth.” Sin and pursuing worldly success can make life not only hellish but needlessly complicated, while living in truth and following the good desires God has placed in our hearts helps simplify things and gives us the grace to rejoice in simplicity. After his conversation with John, Jack experiences liberation from the prison of himself and the world and takes the action of telling Ellie that he loves her and the truth about the songs.

                In telling the truth and living in the truth, the promise of the world disappears (it cannot stand the light), while the thing that really matters and satisfies the human heart, namely love, not only remains but blooms. Jack and Ellie marry and have two beautiful children, and though their life may seem simple or unsuccessful from the standpoint of the world, it is a truly good life that the world could not deliver, and they would not exchange it for the world.